earticle

영어

The Korean big business has been evaluated as a mere private-interest seeker. In contrast to the Korean case, the policy inclination of the Japanese is much more public-interest oriented. The Japanese big business has a strong tendency to take care of such issues as the social integration, welfare, environment, and even international stability and peace. What makes the Korean big business differ from the Japanese? The purpose of this study is to explain this difference between the two. A hypothetical explanation to this question is proposed as follows: The higher is the international competitiveness of the big business, the stronger is its public interest inclination. This hypothesis is evaluated through the following three methods: comparison of the spacial difference between the two countries during the same period, comparison of the periodical difference of the attitudes of the big business within the same country, and comparison of the spacial difference among several countries during the same period. The result of this study tells us that the rent-seeking behavior of the Korean big business comes at least in part from its low level of international competitiveness.